• admissions,  applying for U of T,  competition,  GPA,  life science,  u of tears

    the early bird catches the… admission?

    hi! I’m referring to U of T St. George and planning to apply to Life Sciences for Fall 2027 through early admission. In general terms, what would be considered a super safe bet academically for early admission, without discussing personal grades or chances? I’m trying to understand overall competitiveness. Also, I’ve heard a rumour that Life Sciences at U of T tends to result in lower GPAs than other universities due to program difficulty and grading. Is that accurate or a misconception? Thanks! 


    heyyo,  

    what is with all the life sci kids asking questions these days? i guess you guys just really love aska. don’t worry, i love you too.

    the thing is that early admission doesn’t really exist at uoft, at least in the sense it does at other unis — for one, you only apply once, not separately for “early” and regular admissions. in fact uoft sends its first round of acceptances in february, later than most ontario unis (it was the last one i got!). february is the earliest i recall seeing for first round of admissions, though the website says they can come out as early as late january 

    soooo “early admission” at uoft basically just means you might get your acceptance about a month before most people, who get admissions in march-may. now if getting in january/february is what you want, you’ll have to apply earlier too. this year the deadline to be considered for that first round was november 7th. if you miss it, welp, no “early admission,” but as long as you apply by the final deadline, you’ll be considered for all the other rounds!  

    for life sci mid-high 80s is the admission range, so you’d probably wanna be on the higher end of that (or even higher) if you want in on the first round.

    and yes, trust me, i am very much aware of the rumours. i’m not in life sci so tragically i can’t give you my personal experience, but i’ve heard varying things from different people. some are able to get really high gpas and others don’t. maybe the ratio is a bit different than other unis? i’m not sure. some stats prof should assign their students a project to figure that one out for us.

    but what i can say is that lots and lots and lots of people have gone from uoft life sci undergrads to phds and med schools (either at uoft or other unis)! it’s absolutely not impossible to do well.  

    i’m sorry i couldn’t fully confirm or deny your question about the rumours, but i hope this still helped! best of luck applying next year! 

    cheers, 

    aska 

  • campus,  choosing,  competition,  courses

    day 47389 of asking you to be more specific

    What courses do you think are the least to highest in competitiveness. And also what campus do you think are the least to highest in competitiveness.


    hey there,

    well, as you can see on the U of T course timetable, there are almost 8000 courses offered during the fall/winter school year across all its undergrad faculties.

    you want to know which of these are the least to highest in competitiveness? have i got a list for you, ranked highest to lowest in competition:

    1. ANT192 murder and other deathly crimes
    2. CRI480 interpersonal violence
    3. ECO316 applied game theory
    4. ECO380 markets, competition, and strategy
    5. STA475 survival analysis
    6. BMS411 squid game and the media
    7. PCJ260 intro to peace, conflict, and justice
    8. CSE270 community dis/engagement and solidarity
    9. PSY336 positive psychology
    10. CHE334 team strategies for engineering design

    wait maybe applied game theory should be number one, cause that’s crazy. do they apply? game theory? in class? against each other? for grades? who cares about deathly crimes (aka emotional warfare) when you’ve got grades on the line.

    Joking Just Kidding GIF

    ok don’t take anything i just said seriously. i’ve just been emotionally scarred by some classmates.

    jokes aside, realistically, there is no way of saying which of the 8000 courses are highest and lowest in competitiveness without taking all of them or having some sort of crazed opinion-based database. unfortunately, the closest U of T students have ever come to making one of those was the anti-calendar, which mysteriously died out sometime in 2011.

    the only actual general knowledge on competitiveness at U of T is that the rotman business programs are definitely every-man-for-himself. i know several people in rotman, and not only is it super difficult to get good grades there, you have to be extensively involved in extra-curricular programming and clubs. the vibe is that there’s a lot of fake sucking-up and networking in those circles. i heard they do peer evaluations after some group projects, where they have to prepare an argument to present to their prof as to why they should get higher grades than their group members who “did less work”. brutal, i tell ya.

    Romantic Comedy Drink GIF by filmeditor

    so as you’ll probably guess, competition also depends on the size of your program. i think with really popular programs that have limited enrolment, you would encounter more competition in class rather than in open enrolment programs. some of the smaller programs also have more tight-knit communities, where everyone is more welcoming and kind to each other. i’d say this is definitely the case with niche social science programs.

    from past research, i’ve heard entry into the computer science program is really competitive, though i’m not sure how it is after you get in. and, i took some political science adjacent courses and those were pretty competitive compared to life sci courses i’ve taken. in poli sci/public policy/peace conflict and justice courses, i guess you’ve just got a concentration of people who want to be world leaders or politicians, so you get the vibe.

    Will Smith Kayla Samuels GIF

    honestly, it would be a lot to give my opinion on every single one of the 700 programs U of T offers, so maybe give me a shortlist of ones that you’re curious about instead?

    as for competition across the three U of T campuses, i can actually tell you about that because i can actually count the number on one hand :D!

    based on what i’ve heard from people who have taken classes in all three campuses, UTM (mississauga) is the most competitive, UTSG (st. george) is in the middle, and UTSC (scarborough) is the least competitive. however, that’s not to say every single UTM course is competitive, i think it just depends what your specific program would be.

    anyhoo, hope this somewhat answered your questions? if not, i hope you enjoyed my yap session.

    and if you really want an answer, don’t hesitate to shoot another, more specific, question!

    over and out,

    aska